The demented and murderous artist had taken care to lower the Marquis's trousers. His genitals had been cut with a sharp blow. But the spectacle offered suggested that his torturer had played the threat of castration, a bit like the employees bragging the "Scenic Railway" at Luna Park when they activated the brake ... The killer had thus applied to enjoy the descent on the roller coaster of horror.
Katarina was literally crushed by so much infamy. As if the devil had decided to impose on Madame Bansbergan infernal waltz. The guilty, moist feeling that had been left in her presence of the Marquis penis was transformed into a mental melody, haunting and perverted. The idea ofhaving in her the seed of a dead man changed into a desire for hysterical flight, which the situation made impossible. But things escalated further into horror when one noticed that the genitals of the marquis had been used to paint a motif on one of the walls. An abstract motif she had no difficulty in deciphering the meaning: it represented a crimson banner fluttering in the wind.
The viscera of the Marquis were scattered on the ground ... as if the sickle that had thus mutilated it had been the bow of an alienated violinist.
A statue representing a Baphomet of operetta had been shattered on the poor Marquis. To know if the object was broken before or after this indescribable murderous act was obscene curiosity.
A lugubrious horror was expressed by the glassy eyes, frightfully bulging in the dark face; and the twisted mouth discovered livid gums and yellow teeth biting an enormous purple tongue.
One of the gentlemen, a long, bearded, bearded man, said, showing that he was a doctor:
- Death goes back to about seven o'clock ...
"The crime was committed between midnight and one o'clock," said another, who wore a thick beard.
- Are you the servant who warned the duty officer?
- It's me ..., Valentine confirmed.
- What's the name of the victim?
- From Varmand, Tristan ...
- Varmand? ...
- Without t, with a s ...
Kneeling at the bedside, Katarina sobbed at these words. All the cheerfulness of her old friend and fleeting lover, now consumed, turned into horrifying sadness.
The character with the goat dried his tears by asking him, as well as Johan, what they were doing and who they were.
It was then that the third gentleman, addressing Mrs. Bansberg, said as gently as he could:
- Let the Commissioner finish his observations, madam. Stay away for a moment. And allow an old acquaintance to remember to you ...
- Mr Jean Ray! she said, holding out her hand. In what dark circumstances I find you, sir! ... »
Here, indeed, is the entry on the scene of the one who tries to tell this story with precision, and who would apologize for having to speak for his own account, if the duty of accuracy does not force.
I repeat: my presence with the late M. de Varmand was most fortuitous. Going down the Rue d'Assas for an early morning walk, I saw a servant who had been defeated exposing the policeman in the area to a certainly dramatic affair. I pulled my card from a judicial reporter. Valentin persuaded the agent and me to go to the scene. We did it, and he left us to go to the Police Commissioner. It is from there that, knowing the mutual friendship of Johan and the Marquis, he had thought it expedient to pass Boulevard Montparnasse.
I had known Mrs. Bansberg in the days of Mother Monet, to whom I bought violin strings, rosin, and music; and I had become a good friend of the good old woman to be invited to her niece's wedding. Since then I had not seen the lovely Katarina again. But her eyes were unforgettable, and from the first, although her beauty bore the marks of pain, I had found in the newcomer the girl of old.
For Johan, it was very different. If he had not accompanied his wife, I think that his sight would have recalled nothing to me, and that the name of Bansberg would not have come to my lips at the sight of this little lame and stunted man whose features ravaged remained strained in a sore grin.
He greeted me with an absorbed air.
I say to Katarina:
"So, you were in touch with M. de Varmand?
No doubt I had seen the Marquis at the wedding of yore, but his name no longer spoke to me, and his death mask was no more than a distant allusion to his living figure.
Katarina told me the links that united them, without asking me the reason for my presence, justified by my profession. Then, yielding to my prayer, she informed me of the character of M. de Varmand, whose eccentric lodging had provoked my amazement.
She was staring upset at the upside-down chairs and the shattered canvases. A door hung ragged. Brushes strewed the pushed up and wrinkled carpets. Honored the skeleton, unhooked during the fight, had slumped on his kneecaps, the skull buried behind a pouf. Isidore, all dressed in white, lay on the ground.
The doctor carefully examined the corpse.
- There is not a shadow of a doubt! He stated. I have never seen such horror of my career ...
In turn, the commissioner leaned forward, frowning.
"Call Agent Pintard," he said.
One of the two men who said nothing came out.
- Who are these people? Katarina asked me.
- Police officers.
- You will admit that it is not commonplace! said the commissary, half sullenly bewildered.
The doctor, careful, nodded.
But Agent Pintard introduced himself with respect.
"Monsieur Ray," said the commissary, "are you and Pintard the first to arrive?
"Yes, called by Monsieur," I replied, pointing to the valet.
- What's your name, boy?
A puff of rum and coffee filled the air. Valentin declined his name, first names and quality.
At that moment, the back door opened and gave way to two figures I saw for the first time. A tall, pale old man was advancing towards us, preceding a woman wearing a piped cap, and afflicted with a strange effacement of physiognomy; his features, except the rapacious mouth, were only intentions and impulses.
The old man was walking straight; his hard eyes, sunk in shady orbits, seemed to see no one. But his gaze fell on the divan, and his pallor, which was extreme, grew stronger.
I guessed it was Mr. Edgar Bansberg, before he had told the police commissioner; Johan and he, despite their age and size, were alike. Only Johan was just the dull copy of this angular model.
The father and son silently gave each other their hands, while Valentine's wife opened her greedy lips to answer the interrogation of the official.
- Let's resume! said this one. Valentine, what time did you enter here?
- Half-past six, Commissioner.
- Describe to me what you saw.
A cruel embarrassment stupefied the good man.
The doctor intervened:
"There is nothing wrong with the scene being restored," he said. Examination of the body will require the cutting of clothing, and I do not see the urgency given its condition.
- Perfect! the commissioner agreed. Moreover, the investigating judge will not delay ... He will be happy to see things as they were ... We phoned for photography?
"Yes, Commissioner," said one of the policemen.
- Well! let's go! Mr. Ray, and you, Pintard, fix that, since it was you who disturbed him. Valentine, you did not touch anything, did you?
- Oh! no sir; I screamed and fled to the street ...
Mrs. Bansberg then told me how stupid she was to see us, the police officer and I, mistreating the remains of the dead like a vulgar object in a cabinet of curiosities. Had we not, indeed, profaned the most sacred?
Charlotte, the maid, claimed to have heard the Marquis come home late and was probably drunk.
- After? said the commissioner. Complete silence?
- Yes ... and I went back to sleep. I was tired…
Valentine is emboldened:
- The mannequin was still posted against the entrance ... You would have said he was ambushed behind the door to jump on the arrivals ...
"Yes, yes," grumbled the Commissioner impatiently. But all this is staging. Which explains this stupid wooden mannequin. There are two doors by which the real murderer could have entered this workshop: this one, which gives in the building, is not it? and that one, which communicates by the stairs with the building next door ...
Charlotte's features became petrified, and she said with barely restrained irritation:
- Good Lord! Nobody went through the door ...
- Then it would be through the other door ...
The commissioner shrugged and tugged on his beard.
"There is only one socket around the victim's neck," the doctor said. In other words, M. de Varmand was seized by the throat as soon as he returned home, here on the threshold of this room; and his attacker did not let him go. At first he struggled, caught in the vice that suffocated him and prevented him from shouting. He tapped, he fought his feet, fists and cane. But the assailant held him well and, to avoid the noise, he pushed him into the cushions of this sofa. That's where he conveniently started his devilish carnage ... I give you my version for what it's worth, but you'll recognize that appearances ...
He paused to open a sign in the large bay window, Mrs. Bansberg showing signs of failure. She wiped her shaking face. The combat evoked by the doctor had icy horror. The frightful group formed by the Marquis and his scattered organs, was an intolerable torment. She went to the window and breathed the fresh air.
We turned to him who, in a cavernous voice, had just pronounced this denial. Right as in armor. Mr. Bansberg Sr. seemed some inspired prophet. The attention of the group is on the wooden dummy ...
- That damn mannequin!! And he resumed after a pause:
"For some time, gentlemen, it is with the help of this model that my friend and colleague was engaged in the practices of necromancy. It was in this artificial man that he called the soul of the dead and that these souls came by turns to speak to him.
The doctor, still looking at the old man, whispered something in the Commissioner's ear, and I heard him whisper to him:
- Yes: Edgar Bansberg, you know ... The waltz of the occultists! ... the other too. Two types! The most beautiful ornament of my neighborhood! ... Wait, we'll question him. Mr. Bansberg, can you tell me how M. de Varmand went about talking with souls?
- It's an initiation that you ask me there! ...
- In what way did the spirits manifest themselves, through this manikin?
Sometimes by phrases escaping from the simulacrum in the darkness; sometimes by blows on the inside.
"Do you know if M. de Varmand intended to speak of the dead last night?
"I do not think he ever did it in solitude. He did not give me anything. We did not have dinner together.
Charlotte then spoke again:
- I can tell you that Mr Varmand did these diabolical sessions just yesterday!
The spiritist seizes this revelation.
"Spirits," he said, "are eager for incarnation. To be evoked is for them a kind of transient resurrection which fills them with bitter joy. One of them would have stayed in the dummy that it would not surprise me.
But Charlotte, tenacious, insisted:
"And perhaps I can tell you who he was with, Monsieur Varmand?"
The shrew darted on Johan an owl's look.
Johan took a step forward and said:
- It's with me ... I was going to talk to you about it.
We all felt the opposite. To be sure, Charlotte was not friendly; but we could not know that she hated in Johan the heir of her master, the only son to whom the millions of the former notary were soon to fall. A conscientious and mistrustful housekeeper, it seemed normal to us and it seemed to us happy that she exercised close surveillance in this Baroque house. On the contrary, nothing explained Johan's attitude and hesitation. He was haggard, badly combed, unshaven, not washed. His eyes fled, less timid than timid; and he held his hands firmly, lest they should see that they trembled.
- Here! said the servant with a little chuckle of pleasure.
- What! exclaimed Mr. Edgar Bansberg. Did you come here, Johan? And you made occultism, Varmand and you? ...
Such amazement rounded his eyes, that we had the certainty of being engaged on a good track. Johan understood it, and could not help but let it appear. Pintard leaned back casually at the door of the staircase. Bouillard got closer to the other exit, and his colleague closed the window.
Katarina, greenish, was triturating her handkerchief.
"It is perfectly correct," said Johan, with sudden firmness, "that I stayed here with M. de Varmand yesterday, from seven to eight, and that this manikin served him for what he called" the evocation of the dead ". But I hasten to add ... "He hesitated, before his father, to decry occultism, and only said:" It was for him to give me an idea ofhis science; I am not a follower ...
"Even so," said Charlotte, in a sly and sweet tone, "say a little what deaths you have brought?
Johan, with a gesture, wanted to translate his contempt.
"Commissioner," cried Charlotte, "I am frank! The devil! They brought the devil!
She was furiously shaking her unpleasant hands that seemed out of socks. Then there was a moment of silence. And the commissioner, observing Johan, said:
- What I remember especially, sir, is that you are probably the last person who saw Mr. de Varmand ...
- We told you he was late in the day ...
- No. We were told that someone had entered here around midnight fifteen. Is it he who came back? The question is valid. We'll find out if he's out and, in this case, where he spent the evening.
- But his hat, his cane, sir, here are some proofs ...
Katarina, who for a moment seemed more nervous, rushed to her husband:
- It's not him, sir! It is not him! It's me! Johan looked at her, full of dismay.
Katarina was suffocating. His vehemence, his turmoil, the fatigue of his features, the negligence of his yet elegant dress, made up a shady ensemble, the same that characterized Johan. The violence of his cry raised the Commissioner's suspicions.
- What do you mean? he said sternly.
6 – IN THE LAP OF MYSTERY
She was losing her breath, which we oppressed ourselves.
"It was I who saw M. de Varmand for the last time," she said finally. It's not my husband.
I was relieved. For a moment, I do not know what formidable doubt had kept us in suspense.
Johan put his face to the expression zero. His father was very interested in seeing Katarina. Charlotte, her fists on the platitudes that served her hips, stretched her upper body forward, like a burlesque gargoyle. The others attended the show without wanting to sound as vibrant as they were.
Katarina developed:
M. de Varmand spent the evening at my house. He arrived there a little after nine o'clock, and left a little after midnight; my maid will testify, and maybe my concierge. We live ten minutes from here, Boulevard Montparnasse. According to the time when M. de Varmand returned home, it seems to me certain that he has returned directly.
- And your husband did not see him? the commissioner wondered.
Johan dispelled the equivocation:
M. de Varmand was an old friend of my father and myself. He regarded my wife as his niece, and came very often to keep him company when my occupations made me leave her alone.
- What time did you go home, sir? Long after the departure of M. de Varmand?
The young man was indignant, outraged by the suspicions he penetrated:
- Ho! indeed, sir, "he exclaimed. But Katarina, this time, answered for him:
- My husband directed last night the Orchester Purple, of which he is the conductor. He returned a few minutes after the departure of M. de Varmand. Concert musicians will testify to his presence among them from half-past eight in the evening to four o'clock in the morning; because we made music at home until that time. And since then, I have not left my husband ...
- That's fine, ma'am, th
ank you. Excuse me, but Mr. Johan Bansberg seemed unaware that M. de Varmand had come to your house in his absence, and ...
"I did not know it at all," said Johan with aplomb.
"Because, given the time of your return and the departure of M. de Varmand, I cannot explain why M. de Varmand did not wait for your arrival to take leave of Madame Bansberg.
- He had seen me a few hours ago! Johan said. To see me again did not seem to him indispensable, and to meet with musicians would have obliged him, by politeness, to remain longer than he wished.
Devil's Score: A Tale of decadent omen…. Page 17
